Indispensable! Hi, it’s me again. I got up early so I could bring you a new story about Highland Park schools and the letter our Governor sent to parents in that school district. The letter was clearly aimed at riling them up and encouraging them to demand their elected officials willingly step aside to let the state come in and […]

Warning, Warning! Danger, Will Robinson! Michigan Governor Rick Snyder took the unprecedented step of sending a personal letter (pdf) to the parents of the Highland Park school system. Dear Parent,As a parent of a Highland Park School District (HPS) student, you are probably aware of the dire financial situation that exists in HPS. Over the past few weeks, together with […]

Here comes aNOTHER one, just like the OTHER one Another Michigan city staring down the barrel of an Emergency Manager: Taylor, Michigan. TAYLOR — The audit presentation to the City Council by Plante Moran painted some grim financial realities Saturday morning. A general fund deficit of $1.7 million was discussed, which the audit found of the fiscal year ending June […]

Brothers & sisters, can you spare a dime? Hello, folks. As I have been talking about for some time, I am going to be doing quarterly week-long fundraising drives for Eclectablog. This is in place of running those incredibly annoying third-party ads for cellulose reduction or hot Russian singles that you see on some blogs. Once a day for seven […]

Historic Detroit treasures lost in rush to save money Eric T. Campbell has a fine piece up at The Michigan Citizen where he talks about the loss of Detroit’s historic school buildings. The Detroit Public School Emergency Managers Robert Bobb and, now, Roy Roberts, don’t appear interested in saving these historic buildings. Once they are gone, they are gone forever. […]

Last night was the second State of the State address by Michigan Governor Rick Snyder. Pundits around the state are weighing in on how shallow it was, with no specifics or new initiatives announced. Before I get into my analysis, it’s worth noting how difficult the Republicans made it for me, my wife Anne and Christine Barry from Blogging for […]

Christine Barry and I will be livetweeting the Michigan State of the State address live from the media room inside the Capitol Building. Follow the action at Blogging for Michigan. Christine Barry, blogger extraordinaire The general State of the State Twitter hashtag is #MOSOTS. Apparently there was major drama about whether or not it would be #MISOS or #MISOTS. All […]

I shit you not, the tagline to this ad is “Why would we ever vote for someone who is just like Obama when we can unite around like Rick Santorum and beat Obama?” Yup, that Mitt Romney, he’s “just like Obama”. Can barely tell the two apart. Brutha from anutha mutha, you might say. Two peas in a pod. Lefty […]

Great coverage by The Rachel Maddow Show last night of the march and rally in front of the gated community where Michigan Governor Rick Snyder lives. Rev. David Bullock was spot-on perfect with his message and it’s one that will resonate with a wide variety of people. My favorite part of Rev. Bullock’s comments came at the end. There is […]

Not unexpected, just another drop in a torrent: Governor Rick Snyder has declared a financial emergency in Highland Park, and will appoint an Emergency Manager. Gov. Rick Snyder today said he would appoint an emergency manager to oversee the financially troubled Highland Park School District – just hours before state officials announced they are reluctantly giving the district a $188,000 […]

Yesterday, I wrote about how Pontiac Emergency Manager Louis Schimmel signed an agreement with Oakland County to manage monies from a substantial HUD grant. This boneheaded decision, it turns out, would have resulted in a loss of upwards of $800,000 per year for Pontiac. Thankfully, Congressman Gary Peters stepped in to prevent this from occurring. Federal and local politicians lined […]